Thermal degradation of sucralose and its potential in generating chloropropanols in the presence of glycerol

Sucralose, a polychlorinated synthetic high-intensity sweetener is being increasingly used in relatively large amounts in baked products under high temperature environments. This necessitates understanding its thermal decomposition and studying the consequences of hydrogen chloride release from sucralose and its ability to chlorinate various food related ingredients such as glycerol to generate chloropropanols a potentially toxic class of compounds. Studies conducted on the thermal degradation of sucralose under dry heating conditions have indicated that the glycosidic cleavage occurs through the formation of a galactopyranosyl cation contrary to sucrose where fructofuranosyl cation dictates the major breakdown products. Consequently the major product detected was levoglucosenone and its precursor. Subsequent degradation of the two monosaccharide derivatives causes dehydrochlorination and dehydration reactions to produce furan-related products. In addition, pyrolysis of sucralose in the presence of glycerol generated significant amounts of 3-monochloropropanediol and 1,2- and 1,3-dichloropropanols based on the relative intensities of their chromatographic peaks which amounted to 15% of the total chromatographic peak area.